


One to Start Again

by counterheist



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Angst, M/M, Unrequited Love, based on a song but not a songfic, ridiculous amounts of ramblethoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-29
Updated: 2011-06-29
Packaged: 2017-11-29 13:16:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/687373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/counterheist/pseuds/counterheist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And if the plane lifts off I’ll write you a letter, to say goodbye, and I will make it long and maybe lie just a little, tell you that I’m doing fine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One to Start Again

**Author's Note:**

> One of the earlier times I listened to [The One I Love](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hpB3lkA4U0) this scenario struck me. That was October. It’s mostly in the [lyrics](http://www.metrolyrics.com/the-one-i-love-lyrics-greg-laswell.html).

‘What do you mean you are leaving?’

No. It wouldn’t sound like that. _He_ wouldn’t sound like that. Veneziano tries again.

‘How could you be leaving?’

Still too unsure. Still too needy. Still too a little something that lives in Veneziano’s head and not a large someone who lives in various houses and apartments and offices, mostly the offices, the spare keys for which Veneziano has accumulated across the years.

‘I find it unacceptable that you are leaving!’

Closer. That is closer, because it is angry and yelling, but still. But still.

Germany yells _at_ Veneziano. Not for him. Not reaching towards him with his voice outstretched.

And that is why Veneziano is sitting in the third compartment from the front of a train, zipping his way towards the Berlin airport at the speed of regret. Regret and electricity derived from thousands of silver panels standing in cloudy, misty fields, and Germany is so proud of them. The fields and the panels; perhaps not the mist. Perhaps not the missed timing either, because Veneziano also travels at the speed of ‘two minutes later than it should have been’, where is that famous German punctuality now, and he clutches the handle of his bag and tries not to think about how ‘later than it should have been’ is an awful speed to run one’s life at.

Naturally it’s the speed he’s been falling for thousands of years.

Naturally it’s caught up to him more than once. This is one more incident in the stream of many. But that doesn’t stop the sting, and _bitte, links aussteigen_ , and he has arrived.

It is four thirty-three in the morning, and Veneziano has arrived in a large circle of nowhere.

That’s not fair.

Veneziano stands next to the elevator, waits for it to pull him up the sleek glass channel to the almost sun, and thinks that while Germany’s very nice airport is very nice and smells like wurst and newspapers and other nice things, it’s also the largest blank spot his heart has ever seen. Is that irony? Is that punishment for Germany, and his memories, and his lack of memories, and the past, and how the future is full of things Veneziano doesn’t want it to be, and the present, and how the present is full of Veneziano acting the way Veneziano has always acted, and oh.

The back wall of the elevator greets Veneziano hello. Guten Morgen.

Servus.

_Ciao._

Behind him, a lone businessman coughs. Veneziano steps forward. He steps out again at Departures, him and his suitcase, slim and stylish both, and neither of them knows where to go. Stopping to ask his suitcase is something Veneziano might have done if Germany were there, maybe, because whimsy is easy with Germany next to him bringing every bit of responsibility and gravity that anyone ever needs, and because Veneziano doesn’t always notice when he’s being silly anymore.

But the giant signboard catches his attention faster, and he follows its glow instead. The lit letters are beacons, calling out to him, and Veneziano scans them for something new. New and soon.

Veneziano needs something new and soon, not something achingly old and about to pass away into a memory. A lost memory? A memory memory, then. Veneziano doesn’t want to lose the time he’s had, even though he’s currently running away very impressively, before the sun has even risen.

He hasn’t even had his cappuccino yet and Romano would know how serious that is, except Veneziano can’t call Romano because Romano would say ‘I told you so’ after he finished saying ‘the _fuck_ is wrong with you, calling me so late?’

France would tell him to visit. France would tell Veneziano to tell Big Brother everything, frère, and come drench his age-old sorrows in wine, and words, and Paris. France would only say that because France wouldn’t know the whole story, would know there is sadness in Veneziano’s voice but not why. Veneziano won’t go to France. He can’t crawl into old arms anymore.

He needs something new.

Scanning the rows of times and delays, Veneziano thinks about nothing in particular.

He cannot visit Spain. They went to Spain once, for a change, just for a holiday. Spain had welcomed them with open arms and only clouds on the days when England turned up or when Romano refused to speak with Spain in a fit of whatever it was that kept Romano running from day to day. Veneziano wonders what the weather is like in Liguria at the moment.

He definitely can’t go home.

Veneziano isn’t so silly not to know where his home is; he’s very, very silly by now, sillier with each passing decade, but he knows that Berlin is nothing more than a place that is not within his borders. It’s not within his grasp either, anymore, maybe it never was, and Germany is asleep and Veneziano is running.

Standing in front of a signboard, but running.

The flickering of an almost-departed, but no, no, now ten minutes delayed flight time catches Veneziano’s eye and decides for him. Yes.

Yes.

He appreciates the plane’s indecision, although he calls it ‘decision-making’ in his head ( _it’s very bad to make decisions without pondering all the outcomes first, of course it is and ve, what’s that over—_ ) and buys a ticket with a shiny black card. He gets a new copy every few months or years, one of those two, along with instructions not to tell Romano which color the plastic is.

The lady at the desk has to see the color, though, because she has to see the card, and five smiles later Veneziano is even closer to having no idea what he’s doing. Next are the metal detectors and pat-downs, and the formality brushes away the familiarity. Soon Veneziano feels no more than a guest. Just like everyone else, ve, like any other traveler. Security wraps careful layers on top of the walls he has just begun to restore, even as they ask him politely to shed his suit coat. Veneziano complies because they ask nicely, and politely, and they smell like newspapers and wurst, too, and they speak to him in soft commands. Soft but direct, and Veneziano thinks of offices and the ones who never really leave them.

Further inside his mind he has plans for the distant arches and traceries, deceptively fragile-seeming as always, that will keep his heart safe.

But that is nothing for him to think about now; Veneziano is about to go on an adventure! He is setting off on a new holiday, all on his own, to a land he hasn’t visited in quite some time. He will run by to say hello at just the right time, dinner, and then he will retreat somewhere…

…somewhere…

…he’ll figure that part out later. Adventures aren’t spontaneous when they are planned in advance, now, they _can’t_ be, ve… don’t look at me like—

Of course there is no one watching Veneziano through the window of the plane. That would be ridiculous. It’s far too cold out on the wing, because it is still so early, and when they begin to fly it will be even colder. Anyone standing outside, in flustered disapproval or otherwise, would freeze.

Veneziano downs his complimentary champagne and toasts the empty seat next to him. It is a _good_ thing there isn’t anyone there. Veneziano is out on a spontaneous one-half nation adventure, and for that he only needs himself. Not the warmth of an armrest shared, not the memories that paint every city in over a hundred years bright blackredgold.

He knows he has been crying for the past two hours, ever since he locked the apartment door and slid ever single key he has ever borrowed ( _or stolen, or been given paired with a blush_ ) back underneath the crack to where he couldn’t reach, or grasp, or change his mind. It had been difficult.

It had been so, so difficult.

And Veneziano doesn’t know why he did it in the first place.

Germany never said anything about leaving.

But he never said anything about staying either, and.

And.

And.

And Veneziano pulls the newspaper from the side of his bag, buckled into the seat next to him no, ve, it will be fine there Miss, it’s traveled with me before and it knows not to be scared! He pulls a pen from his pocket, something else his boss had given him as though it were important, chooses one of the less important sections ( _…Altersvorsorge?_ ), and sets his pen to the page in between the orderly blocks of text.

 

_Dear Germany,_

I might be gone a little while…

**Author's Note:**

> The original idea was that amnesiacHRE!Germany is slowly growing apart from North and getting cozy with other nations, perhaps France, in ways North doesn’t think is entirely fair. He chooses to flee. You only get to see North’s thoughts on the matter, instead of the matter. Sorry about that.
> 
>  **Also:** I don’t know why I started this now, but I’m desperately trying to jump my way out of apathy and writer’s block, so there you go. I need to get used to his voice again, even if this is really _really_ srsface. Tell me if you think I butchered his voice, by the way. I do want to know. I have very little idea what I’m doing.
> 
>  **silver panels:** google “Germany solar” and marvel at the power of subsidies and incentives
> 
>  **“bitte, links aussteigen”:** German for ‘our trains are super awesome. The British can all jump out to the right, thanks.’ Or, ‘please exit to the left’. This is from memory, mind, so correct me if I got the words wrong or if there are typically more in there. There might typically be more in there, but I remember a very controlled automated German ladyvoice speaking this, so it’s potentially right somewhere.
> 
>  **“Servus. Ciao.”:** both are greetings that mean hello and goodbye both. DEEPER MEANINGS, MY GOODNESS. I like ‘servus’. I’m pretty sure you only hear it in the south, though.
> 
>  **traceries:** according to Wikipedia, because I am in a Wikipedia sort of mood, “the[ traceries in Venetian Gothic ](http://books.google.com/books?id=p5wTfyx0Lr0C&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=traceries+venice&source=bl&ots=9J9jl-gMvf&sig=b5l6-rZQNcyx5STdI1Y-hr1cuVw&hl=en&ei=OQgMTpDODISosAPz_62PDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CEoQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=traceries%20venice&f=false)supported the weight of the entire building.” Make of that what you will.
> 
>  **Altersvorsorge:** retirement plan. Yeah, even if he knew what it meant he still wouldn’t need to care.
> 
>  **Double Also:** Run-on sentences and repetitions remind me of North Italy. This should explain the entire fic.
> 
>  **Triple Also:** The last line is a quote from the song, as is the title and the summary, which toes the line but _this is still not a songfic_.


End file.
